THAYER, John. Controversy between the Rev. John Thayer, Catholic missionary, of Boston, and the Rev. George Lesslie, Pastor of a church, in Washington, New-Hampshire. Philadelphia: Printed by Richard Folwell, no. 33, Arch-Street, 1795. (160 x 105 mm) pp. 32. Signatures 1, [pi]4, B-D4, 1. Coallated and complete with 19th century fly leaves. 19th century binding in pasteboard with fabric spine. Paper title placard in center of front cover board; paper spine wrapper with library shelf numbers. Spine in delicate condition with some scuffs to gutter side foredge of binding. While binding is fragile, interior text itself is in notably NEAR FINE condition. ESTC no.: W14258 Provenance: Bookplate on pastedown of Franc com a Thun Hohenstein Tetschen; red rubber stamp on verso of title page of Tetschner Bibliotek. About the Text & Historical Figures: John Thayer (1755–1815) was the first New England-native ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. A Yale-educated Congregationalist minister and Revolutionary War chaplain, Thayer converted to Catholicism in 1783 while in Rome, crediting his change of faith to miracles attributed to Saint Benedict Joseph Labre. He studied for the priesthood in Paris with the Sulpicians and was ordained in 1789. Upon returning to Boston, he opened a small chapel on School Street for French Catholics, but soon left to serve Catholics in Virginia and Kentucky. His career was uneven, due largely to his erratic and combative temperament. In 1803, he returned to Europe, settling in Limerick, where he found greater ministerial success. After his death in 1815, his estate funded the first convent in New England—an Ursuline house in Charlestown—which was later destroyed by anti-Catholic rioters in 1834. Thayer’s public conversion from Congregationalist minister to Catholic “divine” earned him the nickname “John Turncoat.” Protestants in New England attacked him with zeal, but Thayer, famously combative, responded with fire, and of course, controversy. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, his “erratic and contentious temper” ultimately led to his failure as Boston’s Catholic pastor. This scarce pamphlet captures that same fire: Thayer defends the infallibility of the Catholic Church and goes after Protestant doctrine with relish. Reverend Lesslie, in turn, fires back, dismissing Catholicism’s “pretended infallibility” as a “cunningly-devised fable.” About the Provenance: Prince Franz Anton von Thun und Hohenstein (1847–1916) was a high-ranking Austro-Hungarian nobleman—essentially European aristocracy with direct ties to imperial governance—who served as governor of Bohemia and briefly as Austria’s prime minister (Minister-President) at the end of the 19th century. His career reflected the internal conflicts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, especially the growing tension between German and Czech national movements. He supported greater rights for Czechs, which made him deeply unpopular among German-speaking elites and ultimately cost him his position. His politics, personality, and personal life (including rumored affairs with actresses) made him both a political lightning rod and a colorful figure in turn-of-the-century Central Europe. To American readers, he might be understood as a kind of old-world equivalent to a controversial governor-senator hybrid—nobly born, politically ambitious, and tangled in the cultural battles of his day.